<a href="http://news.sjvc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Monique-Silva.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-1225" alt="Monique Silva" src="http://news.sjvc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Monique-Silva-290x290.jpg" width="290" height="290" /></a>Mock interviews are an important part of the preparation <a title="SJVC" href="http://www.sjvc.edu">SJVC</a>’s Career Services provides students for their eventual job search. These staged interviews between ‘employers’ and ‘applicants’ can be a little unnerving for students, who are trying to put their most professional self forward for serious employment consideration.

But <a title="Business Administration" href="http://www.sjvc.edu/business-administration/">Business Administration</a> program student Monique Silva must have left her nervousness and uncertainty at the door. After viewing Monique’s performance during her mock interview, the Career Services Director, Joel Morgan, later suggested to the Employment Services Department that they contact Monique about a First Contact/Receptionist position at the college. Monique interviewed on a Tuesday, was offered the position on Friday and started work the following Monday. In less than a week, she went from recent graduate to employee.

“It’s amazing to go from being a student with teachers, to being co-workers and friends,” says Monique. In her new position she gets to welcome visitors and potential students who come to the campus looking for educational opportunity and career success. “I get to share my own experience and tell them that I was once in their shoes,” she says.

Her experience includes a very difficult time the week before finals when her grandfather suddenly passed away. At the same time her daughter Juliett, who had just turned three, was admitted to the hospital with appendicitis. It was a very emotional time and a very demanding time in her program. “My teachers were very supportive and let me do all my work at home,” says Monique.

Monique is enjoying a career that almost didn’t happen. She had tried community college without much success and had worked at a popular market for awhile, and just wasn’t feeling the energy it would take to make a serious commitment to school. By then she and her husband, Daniel, had had their daughters, Alexandria and Juliett, so life was pretty busy. “But, my husband pushed me, ever since we were dating, to go back to school,” says Monique.  His insistence finally paid off.

Monique felt some of the rewards of her efforts along the way. “I loved that my husband and daughters picked me up every day after class and they would ask, ‘Mama did you get an ‘A’ or a ‘B’ today, says Monique.’” Monique enjoys the role model she became for her girls and the source of inspiration for them to work for their own education and successes.

And, Monique may not be finished. “I’m not done with school,” says Monique, who plans to one day get her Bachelor’s degree. Her and Daniel’s <i>Big Dream</i> is to one day open their own restaurant and catering business. “It’s something I’ve always been passionate about,” she says. “My husband is an amazing chef, and it’s just a dream we have.” Theirs is one of many dreams that have begun to take shape at SJVC.